Hairy Frogfish

This small fish grows up to 22 cm (8.7 in) long. Like other members of its family, it has a rounded, extensible body, and its soft skin is covered with irregularly-arranged dermal spinules resembling hairs. Its large mouth is forwardly extensible, allowing it to swallow prey as large as itself. The coloring of its body is extremely variable because individual fish tend to match their living environments.

Frogfishes have the capacity to change coloration and pigment pattern, taking only a few weeks to adapt. The dominant coloration varies from yellow to brownish-orange, passing through a range of shades, but it can also be green, gray, brown, almost white, or even completely black without any pattern. Body and fins can be marked with roughly parallel dark stripes or elongated blotches, some with rays radiating outward from the eye.

The striated frogfish is found in the tropical and subtropical waters from the Indian Ocean to the center of the Pacific Ocean, and in the Atlantic Ocean on the western coast of Africa and from the New Jersey coast to the southern Brazilian coast including the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean. The only waters these fish are not found in are the Mediterranean and the Arctic. Williams (1989) and Arnold and Pietsch (2012), however, considered Antennarius striatus a species complex, and the putative synonym Antennarius scaber is apparently a distinct species from A. striatus in having a bifid esca and 11–12 pectoral rays.

As with all frogfishes, A. striatus is a voracious carnivore which will devour all right-sized prey that pass within reach, usually other fish, but sometimes even its own kind. It can swallow prey its own size.

Like other members of its family, it has a benthic and solitary lifestyle. They gather during mating period, but do not tolerate each other any more after the act of fertilization.